Over breakfast at the Travelodge, I ran through the events of Tuesday evening, as far as I could remember them. My last memory was of sitting in the back of a car with my two friends, surreptitiously drinking from Katie’s bottle and giggling uncontrollably. After that I could remember nothing until I woke up the next morning to find my husband's dead body in bed beside me. There was no way I could have killed him. Apart from the fact that I had been in no state to do anything, it just wasn't something I would do. And it was hardly something I would forget. But even I could see that temporary loss of memory due to drinking wasn't the most robust of defences. I had to come up with something better. And I didn't have much time.
The police forensic team were busy searching my house for clues to what had happened. God only knew what they were going to find. In the meantime, it would be best for me to stay out of sight. I had paid for my night’s accommodation with my credit card which meant the police would easily be able to discover my whereabouts, should they decide to haul me in for further questioning. But I wasn't ready to be taken out of circulation just yet. First, I was going to do my own investigation. Realising that Bella had probably been the last person to see Paul alive, my next step was to arrange to meet her, face to face. But this time I wouldn't bottle it. There was more than mere curiosity driving my interest now.
To carry out my plan unimpeded, I would have to disappear. With Paul’s death I was going to a wealthy woman, certainly wealthy enough to spend a few hundred pounds keeping myself out of sight. I would have to get hold of a new phone, and find somewhere to spend the night, and everything would have to be paid for in cash. Plus, once I had withdrawn enough money, I would need to travel around without leaving any trail, which ruled out using my car or public transport. There was no point in trying to cover my tracks before getting hold of the cash, so I caught a bus back to Harrow and went to an ATM. When I keyed in my PIN number, an error message appeared on the screen: Access Denied. I ran along the street to another bank, but the same thing happened.
I had just over eighty pounds in my purse, barely enough to live on even for a day, and somehow, I was going to have to disappear. And before that, I had to speak to Dan.
To my relief, he picked up straight away. If he had been out and not answering his phone, my plans would have been delayed, and with every passing moment I risked being tracked down if the police were looking for me. I chatted to him for as long as I could, and he sounded as though he was doing all right. When I spoke to Mark, he confirmed that Dan seemed to be coping. They were talking about Paul a lot, he said, but Dan was eating and sleeping, and although he was clearly upset and grieving, he wasn’t making himself ill. Thanking Mark, I told him that I might not be able to call them for a day or two. When he expressed surprise, I struggled to explain that I was swamped with paperwork to do with the funeral arrangements and the probate. That wasn’t true, but I couldn’t think what else to tell him as I might not have access to my landline for a while.
‘Does that mean you have a date for the funeral?’ he asked.
‘No, not yet. It’s all taking forever. But I’ll keep you posted. Don’t worry, everything’s getting sorted out.’
Suppressing a flicker of guilt at having lied, and a pang of jealousy that I wasn’t the one comforting my son, I rang off before Mark could quiz me any further. It must have sounded odd that I wanted to cut myself off from them for a few days, but I hoped he would assume I needed space to come to terms with my loss. People grieved in different ways. Telling myself Dan was in good hands, I turned my attention to my immediate problems.
My priority now was to purchase a phone for cash, so I could contact Bella without the call being traceable. That proved trickier than I had anticipated. None of the first few phone shops I tried were able to sell what I wanted. Finally, I found a young man working in another shop who was prepared to swap my phone for a second hand pay as you go. Although the new phone had cost me more than it was worth, I was happy because part of the deal was that he wiped all my details off my phone. With fifty pounds in my purse, and a new phone that couldn’t be traced, I was satisfied that I was off the radar, at least for the time being.
Seated at a corner table in Starbucks, with a coffee and a pastry in front of me, I called the woman who should have been my worst enemy. She was the only person who might be able to help me.
10
As a rule, I ignore calls from unknown numbers, and I was afraid Bella might feel the same way. But on my third attempt, she answered. My persistence must have persuaded her that someone wanted to speak to her very badly.
‘Bella?’
‘Who is it?’
‘You don’t know me, but I need to meet you.’
‘Have you called before? Is this about Paul? Was it you who was supposed to see me on Thursday?’
Admitting that was me, I apologised for failing to turn up at King’
s Cross. ‘Something came up that prevented me from making it,’ I said.
That was true, in a way, but I didn’t explain that it was my own cowardice that had stopped me from meeting her.
‘Why should I trust you to turn up this time?’
‘Because you want to know what’s happened to Paul.’
She didn't argue with that, and we arranged agreed to meet as before.
Leaving the coffee shop, I went into a stationer’s and bought a notebook which I threw away as soon as I left. I kept the carrier bag. The next few shops I visited were well staffed, but it wasn’t difficult to find one where the changing rooms were poorly supervised. Taking a few T-shirts, a jacket and a handful of scarves, I slipped through into a cubicle. With the door bolted, I checked my haul for security tags. It was a cheap shop and as far as I could see, none of the garments were tagged. So far so good. Quickly I bundled my own jacket and shirt into the carrier bag I had brought from the stationery shop. Then I pulled on an innocuous grey T-shirt and denim jacket. The jacket was slightly too big, and the sleeves were too long, but that didn’t matter. It looked fine with the cuffs turned up. In fact, it made the jacket less obviously stolen, because it didn’t look new. Nothing about my outfit was likely to attract attention. Finally, I chose a turquoise scarf which I stuffed into my handbag. My heart was pounding as I hurried out of the shop, terrified of feeling a hand tap me on the shoulder, but no one challenged me.
Winding my new scarf round my neck, I sauntered into a charity shop and left my own shirt and jacket on hangers, ensuring they were as inconspicuous as possible by leaving them on rails of similar items. If the police were looking for me, I didn’t intend to make it easy for them to find me. In a party shop I paid a few pounds for a pair of costume spectacles with plain glass lenses and black frames. As it happened they quite suited me, but the important thing was they didn’t look fake. They put the finishing touch to my disguise.
So now I was a shoplifter. My new status as a murder suspect, and a fugitive from the law, was proving strangely liberating, since compared to that anything else seemed petty. I knew that I wasn't helping my situation, and I should give myself up to the police before I landed in any more trouble. But I was too angry to surrender my freedom willingly, because none of this was my fault. Paul was to blame for everything and he was the one who had escaped retribution. It wasn't fair. There was no way I was going down without first fighting to clear my name. I owed that much to Dan.
There were CCTV cameras all around the shopping centre, but I wasn’t sure where else to go, so I spent the next few hours sitting in a coffee shop pretending to read a cheap book I had picked up in a bargain store. As a crime thriller it was fast paced and quite exciting, but it barely held my attention. All the time I was aware that I might be a wanted person, and I kept glancing up to make sure no one was watching me.
After about an hour, a couple of uniformed police officers entered and stood in the doorway, looking around. Feeling my heart hammering, I kept my head down pretending to be engrossed in my book. I didn’t dare look up for
a long time and had to remind myself to turn over the pages as though I was really reading. When I finally risked looking up, they had gone, leaving me to wonder whether they had been searching for me or were just passing through on a routine patrol.
I arrived at King’s Cross early and sat down at an empty table to wait for Bella. This time I waved as soon as I saw her red scarf, and she came straight over to my table and sat down.
‘Can I get you a drink?’ I asked, reckless of the fact that I was virtually broke.
Her eyes narrowed. ‘You’re his wife, aren’t you?’
‘How did you know?’
‘I recognise you from the photo on Paul’s desk at work. That’s where we met.’ She sighed. ‘You know, I’m sorry it had to be this way. I hate the fact that I’m sleeping with a man who's still married to someone else.’
‘You didn't let that stop you.’
‘Yes, but I didn’t know about you when it all started.’
‘How can you say you didn’t know? You just told me you saw my photo, so you must have known he was married.’
‘He told me you were estranged.’
‘Why would he have my photo on his desk then?’
She shrugged. ‘If I’d known you still cared about him I would never have let it go this far.’
‘I don’t care about him. He’s nothing to me.’
‘If you don’t still have feelings for him, why would you bother to see me? And I know why you’re here.’ She paused. ‘He told me you didn’t love each other anymore. He said the only person you care about is your son and if it wasn't for him your marriage would have been over a long time ago. But I don't believe that's the case for you, is it? I think you do still love him. That's why you're here. You should tell him how you feel and let him make up his own mind what he wants to do. I’ll understand if he chooses to stay with you. But I don't think that's even a remote possibility.’ A faint smile flickered on her lips. Her smugness made me want to slap her. ‘I know he loves me. He wants to leave you, so he can be with me. It’s all for the best, our meeting like this, so now we can get him to sort this out.’
She seemed confident he would never give her up, as though my nineteen years of marriage to him counted for nothing.
‘That’s not why I’m here,’ I said.
‘He’s going to leave you. He’s told me he’s going to divorce you as soon as he can get you to agree. He might not have persuaded you yet, but that’s what’s going to happen. You can’t force him to stay with you forever.’
I shook my head. It would be needlessly cruel to tell her that Paul had lied to her about having asked me for a divorce.
‘It’s not going to happen now,’ I said quietly.
‘I don’t think that’s for you to decide. Let’s go and ask him right now and end this once and for all.’
She pushed her chair back and began to stand up, but I reached out and put my hand on her arm.
‘Wait, Bella. Please. You don’t understand. It’s already ended.’
Something in my tone must have startled her because she sat down abruptly.
‘I came here to ask you a few questions,’ I said. ‘And to tell you that... There’s no easy way to say this. I’m sorry to tell you Paul’s dead.’
She put her hand over her mouth and her eyes grew wide. ‘No!’ she burst out. ‘You’re just saying that to stop me seeing him. That’s a terrible thing to say. He might be dead to you, but-’
‘Why else do you think he suddenly went silent? You haven’t heard from him since Tuesday night, have you?’
‘He told me he was leaving you. We were going to get married. We were going to start a life together.’ Hiding her face in her hands, she broke down.
With a sigh, I explained that Paul hadn’t knowingly deserted her. He couldn't help being unable to contact her. It was strange, feeling sympathy for this woman who had stolen my husband’s affections away from me, but the reality was that the romance had fizzled out between us a long time ago. I felt an unexpected impulse to comfort Bella. She seemed like a nice girl. If I had come across her in any other situation, I think I would have liked her. I could even understand how Paul might have fallen in love with her.
‘Did he love you?’ I asked.
She shrugged. ‘He said he did.’ She raised her tear stained eyes and looked at me. ‘Why would he say it if it wasn’t true?’
Even she knew that was a stupid question.
‘I suppose we’ll never know, will we?’ I answered my own question.
The difference between us was that I was no longer in love with my husband. I felt sorry for Bella. This wasn’t how I had expected our meeting to go, but I needed to be strong and broach the subject I had come to address. It was awkward. If she didn’t believe me, my situation would be hopeless.
‘The reason I wanted to see you,’ I said and paused. ‘Paul died on Tuesday night.’ Her eyes widened in horror. ‘Did you see him on Tuesday evening?’
‘Yes. But... What happened? How did he die?’
‘I don’t know. The police are looking into it.’
‘The police?’
‘Yes. They’re not sure about the cause of his death. Did there seem to be anything wrong with him on Tuesday evening?’
She shook her head.
‘Only I think you were probably the last person to see him alive and I wondered if you might be able to shed any light on his physical or mental state that evening? Did he complain of feeling ill? Or did he look as though anything was bothering him? Was there anything that struck you as out of the ordinary about him?’
Again, she shook her head. ‘Nothing.’ She frowned. ‘Do the police know about me?’
‘No. They would have been to see you by now if they did.’ I hesitated. ‘It’s probably best if they don’t find out about your affair. They’ll only start pestering you.’
She nodded, and I breathed a silent sigh of relief.
‘You will let me know how it happened, won’t you? I mean, it doesn’t change anything, but I’d like to know.’
‘Of course.’
We both knew I was unlikely to contact her again, but we parted with a hug. It just felt right. Although we would probably never meet again, in losing the man we had both loved, we shared a bond of sorts.
11
I found a Travelodge along Grays Inn Road, half a mile from King’s Cross station. It was a case of hiding in plain sight. Although the central London streets were peppered with security cameras, I was confident my new appearance would go unnoticed. And the busy area gave me a greater anonymity than I might have found in a less densely populated area.
I had been wearing the same clothes all day and would have to wear them again the next day, but I didn’t want to waste money buying more, or risk being stopped for shoplifting. Instead I bought a deodorant and doused myself in it after taking a shower. Rinsing certain parts of my clothes, I dried them with the hair dryer. It took a long time, but it was a kind of respite to be occupied with so mundane a chore.
The traffic outside was clearly audible even with my window closed, but I slept well. In fact, since Paul’s death, my nights had been less disturbed than when he had slept at my side. Even the hum of the traffic was a constant drone while his snoring had been intermittent silences disturbed by sudden loud snorts right by my ear. In some ways, the silences had been worse to bear than the noise of his snoring because, ironically, I had often lain awake listening, afraid that he had stopped breathing. At least I no longer needed to worry about that.
All that concerned me now was avoiding arrest while I investigated Paul’s death for myself. And meanwhile the clock was ticking. If necessary, I was prepared to try and arrange for Dan to remain in Scotland with his grandparents for another week, but I was wary of calling them on my new phone in case the police were monitoring their calls. But one way or another I was going to have to call them the following evening, and I would have to do so without leaving any trace of my location. I had a lot to think ab
out, but I was too tired to make any more decisions that night.
The next morning, I tried to make plans over breakfast. I didn’t have enough cash to spend another night in the Travelodge. The more I thought about my position, the more hopeless it seemed. In my desperation I had allowed myself to believe that Bella would help me. If Paul had been feeling unwell on his last evening with her, I could have persuaded her to go to the police with me, to put the case that he had been ill before he died. But her assertion that he had been fine led me nowhere.
Glancing up, I caught sight of a television screen in the corner of the breakfast area. Fortunately, my coffee mug was almost empty, or it would have spilt all over the table, and the last thing I wanted to do was draw attention to myself while my face was displayed on the London news with a subtitle: “Police would like to speak to this woman.”
There was no longer any question that they were looking for me. Until then, I had always turned to Paul whenever I had a problem. For the first time in my life I really needed help and he had disappeared and was never coming back. Even knowing he had abandoned me for another woman would have been preferable to this. I could still have talked to him and asked his advice. Our relationship had been deeper than romance. He had been my rock for as long as I could remember. Overcome with emotion, I fled from the restaurant of suited business-men with their briefcases, and anoraked tourists with back packs.
Locked in a toilet cubicle, for the first time since my husband’s death, I gave way to despair.
Only the thought of Dan kept me from losing the will to carry on battling to prove my innocence. Somehow, I had to speak to my son and reassure him that everything was all right at home, without revealing where I was or what was going on. I was reasonably confident that the item of London news I had seen wouldn’t be broadcast in Scotland. If Dan saw it, any hope of protecting him from further distress would be wrecked. In the meantime, I had to proceed on the assumption that he knew nothing about my immediate difficulties. The death of his father was more than enough emotional trauma for him to have to deal with. It was fortunate he had such a close relationship with his grandparents, or I don’t know what would have happened to him.
The Adulterer's Wife Page 6